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It's time to let you in on a dirty little secret: You may not own the stock you own. That's right, if you invest with a brokerage firm, the shares you bought are almost certainly not held in your name. Technically, they're held in the name of the Wall Street firm you do business with, hence the term "street name."
No, you haven't been robbed. Ultimately, the decision to hold shares on the books under a different name doesn't affect the economic ramifications for you. You¿re listed as the "beneficial owner," even though the firm is the official owner of the shares. But, you are giving up some rights, and investors concerned about good corporate governance might want to get that stock back in their own names.
Here's the problem: If your stock is technically owned by, say, Merrill Lynch, then Merrill Lynch gets to do things with it that might work against your wishes. Take short selling. Investors who want to sell shares short need to first borrow those shares. The lenders are often the big Wall Street firms that are handing out Street-name shares. So, if you feel that a company you own is a victim of aggressive short selling, chances are your own shares are being used to fuel the shorting.
Also, your brokerage firm can cast ballots on some corporate matters affecting a company without getting your input. Technically, this can only happen in votes considered ¿routine¿ by securities regulators. But, there's a big catch: some big events, like board elections, are considered "routine" under law.
The good news is that you can easily fix the Street name problem: Just request that your brokerage firm makes you the listed owner of the shares. If they refuse, find a new firm.
Home / Markets / Industries / Energy
Tuesday, July 22, 2008
Steelworkers Join Los Angeles Activists in Demanding Occidental Petroleum Stop its Complicity of Human Rights Abuses in Colombia
Comtex
LOS ANGELES, July 22, 2008 /PRNewswire-USNewswire via COMTEX/ ----Colombia Free Trade Agreement Should Not be Passed Until Perpetrators of Killings Against Activists are Brought to Justice
Members of the United Steelworkers (USW), labor and community activists demonstrated in front of Occidental Petroleum headquarters today in support of a people's tribunal in Bogota, Colombia that is hearing evidence of murders and death threats against union activists involving the company's alleged approval.
(Logo: http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20080131/DC12982LOGO )
"Corporations that operate in areas of conflict should not contribute wittingly or unwittingly to human rights abuses," said USW District 12 Director Terry Bonds. "Occidental Petroleum should ensure human rights violations are not being committed by state agents or their proxies operating to defend the company's interests."
Bonds represents USW members in California, including about 80 workers employed at Occidental Petroleum in Long Beach.
Demonstrators chanted slogans like "Enough Violence, Basta Con La Violencia," and held picket signs. They collected signatures for a petition to Congress and delivered a letter to Dr. Ray R. Irani, chairman, president and CEO of Occidental Petroleum.
In the letter, the United Steelworkers Union (USW) expressed concern over Occidental's complicity in human rights abuses in Colombia. The union urged the company to "come clean" about the full extent of its involvement in the Dec. 13, 1998 bombing of Santo Domingo and expressed concern about its reported financial and logistical support for the Colombian 18th Army Brigade, which has committed numerous human rights abuses including the August 2004 murder of three union leaders. There is evidence the Brigade, which helps protect the company's Cano Limon oil pipeline, continues to aid and abet the paramilitary groups.
The Permanent Peoples' Tribunal, Tribunal Permanente de los Pueblos (TPP), being held today and tomorrow in Bogota is exposing transnational corporations like Occidental Petroleum, British Petroleum, Coca-Cola, Nestle, and Chiquita Brands International for their alleged participation with the Colombian security forces and rightwing paramilitary groups in silencing and sometimes killing trade unionists and community activists. The tribunal is composed of 130 members and includes experts in international law, human rights and international humanitarian law.
The lack of prosecution and conviction of those responsible for these killings of human rights activists, trade unionists, journalists, teachers, health workers, indigenous people, peasant farmers and elected officials has led Democratic congressional leaders to hold up the vote on the U.S.--Colombia Free Trade Agreement until the Colombian government proves it is actively going after the perpetrators and brings them to justice.
Labor leaders continue to be murdered with impunity. Since 1991, over 2,300 trade unionists have been murdered. Under President Uribe's tenure, convictions have been reported in 59 trade union homicide cases, an average of less than one per month, for the past five years. Of the 59 convictions, only 22 of them are for the over 450 murders committed since Uribe took office in August 2002.
Ever since it discovered the Cano Limon oil field in 1983, Occidental's presence in the Arauca region of Colombia has attracted the participants of the civil war: leftwing guerrillas, the military and the paramilitaries. According to Amnesty International, many of the human rights abuses done by these groups has occurred in communities and areas that border the company's Cano Limon oil pipeline. Occidental has admitted its personnel have paid the guerrillas in exchange for being left alone.
According to the LA Times, a security firm hired by Occidental to monitor guerrilla movements (another U.S. company known as AirScan) provided coordinates to Colombian military pilots when they dropped cluster bombs on Santo Domingo, a village near one of the company's pipelines. Seventeen civilians, including seven children, died in the attack.
In the past, Occidental supported the Colombian military in its attempt to forcibly remove the U'Wa Indian tribe from its ancestral land to make way for the company's pipelines.
The company successfully lobbied the U.S. for expanded military operations in Arauca and was a big supporter of Plan Colombia, a multi-billion dollar effort to fund the country's military so it could ostensibly fight drug trafficking.
One of the other companies being charged is Drummond, which the USW sued for its alleged role in the murder of three union leaders in 2001. The leaders' union has gone on strike in Colombia against Drummond, thereby increasing their vulnerability to violent reprisals. The USW stands in solidarity with those striking workers.
Besides the Los Angeles demonstration, events are being held today at the corporate headquarters of Coca-Cola in Atlanta and Chiquita Brands in Cincinnati. There are also community-based efforts in New York and Boston.
As the largest industrial union in North America, the USW represents 850,000 active workers employed in the oil, chemical, paper, metals, rubber and service sectors.
For more information on the USW's campaign against human rights violations in Colombia and its opposition to the Colombia FTA, go to: www.usw.org.
SOURCE United Steelworkers (USW)
http://www.steelworkers-usw.org
Copyright (C) 2008 PR Newswire. All rights reserved ********************************************************************** As of Friday, 07-18-2008 23:59, the latest Comtex SmarTrend� Alert, an automated pattern recognition system, indicated a DOWNTREND on 07-08-2008 for OXY @ $81.18. For more information on SmarTrend, contact your market data provider or go to www.mysmartrend.com SmarTrend is a registered trademark of Comtex News Network, Inc. Copyright � 2004-2008 Comtex News Network, Inc. All rights reserved.
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